Songoftheday 9/13/20 - What up pop brace yourself as I ride on top, close your eyes as you ride right out your socks...

 

 

"I'll Be" - Foxy Brown featuring Jay-Z

from the album Ill Na Na (1996)

Billboard Hot 100 peak: #7 (one week)

Weeks in the Top-40: 11

 

Today's song comes from rapper Foxy Brown, who was born Inga Marchand in New York, where she got her start at a talent contest in Brooklyn. While still just a teenager, she guested on a top-40 hit by Case, "Touch Me, Tease Me" (including an extra X in the name then), then lifted her profile even more with her featured turn on Jay-Z's first decent pop hit "Ain't No Ni**a" in 1996.  Later that year, signed to Def Jam Records, Brown released her debut single "Get Me Home", which featured new jack group Blackstreet. The song went all the way to #10 on Billboard magazine's R&B chart, while just missing the pop top-40 at #42. For the follow-up, Jay-Z repaid the favor by making a cameo on Brown's "I'll Be", which rode on a sample of the Rene & Angela #1 R&B hit "I'll Be Good". Produced by the Trackmasters, who wrote the track with Jay-Z, the track landed Brown (and coincidentally Jay-Z) her first top ten pop hit...

"I'll Be" became Foxy's first and only lead-artist top-40 pop hit, reaching the top ten in April of 1997. The song also climbed to #5 on Billboard's R&B chart, making it her biggest success there as well, while going to #2 on their Rap Singles chart. Internationally, the single peaked at #9 in the UK, while making the top-40 in New Zealand (#20) and the Netherlands (#33). The Ill Na Na album came on to the Billboard 200 sales chart at #7, almost making the top at #2 on the R&B Albums list. A third and final single from the album, "Big Bad Mamma" featuring vocal group Dru Hill, scored a third top ten R&B hit at #10, while stopping at #53 on the pop Hot 100, even with a catch sample like Carl Carlton's "She A Bad Mamma Jamma" (although the single did grab a third British top-40 hit at #12). 

Later that year, Foxy joined rappers Nas, AZ, and Nature for the hip-hop "supergroup" the Firm, whose album went to #1. The set's lead single, "Firm Biz", wasn't released as a single in the U.S., but the track got to #35 on Billboard's R&B Airplay chart, and reached #18 in the UK. 

Brown returned in 1998 with her sophomore solo effort, Chyna Doll. The record debuted at #1 on the Billboard 200 as well as the R&B Albums chart, but the lead single, "Hot Spot", only managed to climb to #22 on the R&B singles chart, and slipped on the Hot 100 pop list at #91 (again, it did better in Britain, peaking at #31). In 2001, Foxy released her third disc Broken Silence, which again hit the Billboard 200 top ten at #5. But again, her raunchiness in her lines (even edited) proved a tough sell on the radio, with all three singles missing the Hot 100 pop chart, and the most successful, "Candy" featuring singer Kelis, not even making the top-40 on the R&B chart at #48. However, her luck in the UK was again better, with "Oh Yeah" landing her most recent top-40 hit at #27 there. Since then its been a rocky road, which includes shelved albums and eight months in prison from an assault charge in 2007. In 2005, Brown did come back to the pop top-40, as a featured artist on group 112's single "U Already Know", which spent a week at #3 on the R&B chart and peaked at #32 on the Billboard pop Hot 100. Her most recent release was an EP Brooklyn's Don Diva in 2008, which got to #83 on the Billboard 200 sales list.

Up tomorrow: Lesbian rapper finds some low-rent romance.